Between Now And Then
by Holysinner5527
Summary: Between the lives of Kenren and Tenpou and Gojyo and Hakkai there is a meeting of their souls. Gaiden references. Non-yaoi.


Between Now and Then

Disclaimer: No I don't own. It makes me sad.

Note: I wrote this after just finishing Gaiden. If you haven't read Gaiden then you may not get this…at all.

***

It was a bright warm day. Especially nice for early spring. The man let out a slight sigh. He didn't really have anywhere he wanted to be at the moment. Oh, there were plenty of places he probably _needed_ to be. His superiors would probably be mad that he had simply left without completing his duties…again. But he had never really been one to worry about such things.

Besides, when he had spotted the cherry blossoms blooming so beautifully he had desired nothing more than to see them up close. So he had left his work in favor of going to the large park they had in town.

'I feel like I need some sake.' he mused, gazing up at the blossoms. He didn't really know why the thought had sprung into his mind all of a sudden and he really didn't care to examine it too closely. But sake wasn't all that he felt like was missing. There was someone he should have had with him. But as he paused to wonder who he couldn't come up with an answer. 'Ah well.' he shrugged.

Yet, as he continued to walk through the park some deep part of him was still looking for that person. Someone he couldn't even visualize. That's when he spotted, from across a pond, a man sitting on a bench. He was reading a book by the looks of it. The only part of him visible over the book was the dark hair.

Somehow he knew then that this was the man he had been looking for. Without knowing how he knew, or stopping to question it, he knew it was him. And without knowing why he began running to get to the other side of the pond.

He wasn't thinking. Such a raw feeling like the need to get to this man didn't leave much room for thought. It wasn't something you could question. You just had to go with it. He rushed to the bench where the man was.

He could see now that he had been right about the book. This man also wore glasses and had a pretty face. "Tenpou!" he shouted as he came closer. He didn't know why he had said such a name. He had never met anyone named Tenpou. But as soon as it came out of his mouth it felt right.

The man slowly looked up at him, his eyes slightly widened behind his glasses as the other man came to a halt in front of the bench. "I'm sorry. I'm afraid you have me confused with someone else." the man who was not named Tenpou smiled.

"Oh…uh…no…its just…I don't even know a Tenpou and…" he said through gasps. 'I cant believe I just ran up to some guy I've never seen before just to yell some name of someone I've never met.' he felt the twinge of embarrassment wash over him.

The man with glasses blinked and then smiled. "I see." he said like he understood. Maybe he did. It seemed like it. "Well in that case please sit down." he motioned to the place beside him on the bench.

He took the seat gratefully and pushed his hair out of his eyes. "I don't usually rush up to people and scream random names at them, you know." he reassured.

"I believe you." not-Tenpou smiled.

They both relaxed and soon he offered not-Tenpou a cigarette from his pack, not really questioning the assumption that this man smoked. Not-Tenpou took the smoke without hesitation, putting it up to his lips and leaning into the offered lighter. He inhaled and then exhaled a plume of smoke. After he had done this he blinked in surprise at the cigarette.

"Heh. This may sound odd but I've never smoked before." he smiled.

"Really?" his companion asked with a sense of disbelief that he couldn't quite grasp. "You'd better start I guess. We wouldn't want you to stop feeling alive." as soon as the words left his mouth he grasped the absurdity of them. "Jeeze. Sorry. I usually make a lot more sense."

"Its perfectly fine. For some odd reason I understand." not-Tenpou smiled.

He smiled back, feeling more comfortable with this complete stranger than he had ever really felt with anyone else in his entire life. Being here felt oddly right. Not something you could question. It felt like home.

"The cherry blossoms are beautiful aren't they?" not-Tenpou asked, catching a single petal out of the many that were raining down.

"Yeah." he said.

"Even more so as they are scattered."

This simple sentence seemed to strike a chord in him somewhere. "Yeah. They'd just be boring if they stayed." he said, barely knowing what he was talking about.

The man whose name wasn't Tenpou shot a quick look at his watch and gave a frown. "I'm sorry. It seems I have lost track of the time. I must be going." he smiled apologetically.

"Guess you'd better go then." he shrugged, exhaling smoke.

"Oh, I meant to say this earlier because it seemed the ting to say."

"What's that?"

"It took you long enough." not-Tenpou smiled simply.

He blinked in surprise and then smiled. For a reason he would never grasp he understood. "Sorry."

"Goodbye."

"…later."

And then the man who wasn't named Tenpou was gone. It was just a simple, short, moment in time. But to the man whose name wasn't Kenren it felt like something big had just happened. Maybe it had.

This wasn't the only time between now and then that these souls collided. Every time didn't really last long and happened simply by accident. Once in a library where they had struck up conversation, once in a bar where they had both needed someone who understood, once in a battlefield. Both of them on the opposite side that the other was on. They had fought each other while talking like old friends.

And once when the man who wasn't Tenpou had given up and lie bleeding on a path, waiting on death. An d the man who wasn't Kenren had absolutely no idea how much saving someone could change his life for the better.

**End**


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